Various types of aerial assets, including unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), missiles and the like, are employed to locate, track and intercept targets. For example, missiles of one form or another had been used in combat for centuries prior to the development of guided missile technology in the World War II era. Since then numerous technologies were developed in order to guide aerial assets to their targets or to otherwise locate a target. The use of some form of radiation (e.g., laser or radio waves) has been a common element in many of these guidance systems. However, as advancements in aerial guidance have improved, target sophistication continues to improve as well. The cost and complexity of each aerial asset, although being typically only a fraction of the cost and complexity of most targets, makes it ever more imperative that each aerial asset that is deployed should be as effective as possible. Accordingly, it becomes increasingly desirable to continue to develop enhancements in target location and guidance systems to further the likelihood of success when such aerial assets are employed.
Aerial assets, such as missiles, with increasingly more sophisticated target location and guidance systems have been developed over the years. However, many of these target location and guidance systems require the aerial asset to be able to determine its current location in order to permit the location of the target to be determined. Aerial assets include a variety of systems for determining their current location, but most of these systems require offboard communication. For example, an aerial asset may include a global positioning system (GPS) that requires communication with a plurality of GPS satellites. In some instances, offboard communication by the aerial asset may be prevented, such as in instances in which communication by the aerial asset is jammed. In these instances, the aerial asset may be unable to determine its current location and, as a result, may be unable to determine the location of the target since the location of the target is generally determined relative to the location of the aerial asset.
Inertial navigation systems have been utilized in order to determine the location of an aerial asset without any requirement for offboard communication. While an inertial navigation system may not be susceptible to being jammed, the location determined by an inertial navigation system may drift over time. As such, the location of an aerial asset as determined by an inertial navigation system may not be as accurate as desired, particularly in instances in which the inertial navigation system is utilized for a period of time such that the error attributable to drift accumulates. Since an inertial navigation system may not determine the location of an aerial asset with sufficient precision, reliance upon an inertial navigation system, at least for extended periods of time, may also unable to locate and track a target in as precise a manner as is desired.